Contingent valuation has been used extensively in estimating the value of
environmental goods. One criticism of this approach, however, is that respondents in
referendum-style contingent valuation surveys may express citizen assessments that
take into account benefits to others rather than benefits that accrue purely to the
respondent themselves. Within this context, the aim of this paper is to examine to
what extent individuals express different preferences when adopting a personal or a
social/citizen perspective. While this paper provides some support for the hypothesis
that individuals express different preferences when adopting collective as opposed to
personal choices, reported willingness to pay (WTP) was found to be insensitive to
whether or not the respondents were asked the WTP question from a personal or
social perspective.

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